Bob Dylan - Folk Songs of America Playlist

 Self Portrait remains one of the most controversial albums in Dylan's nearly 60 years as a recording artist. Though opinions have softened considerably, in no small part thanks to the release of 2013's Another Self Portrait bootleg series entry, it still has plenty of detractors.

SP is a strange album by design being a mix of original compositions, covers and live material. This might paint a fairly (and fittingly) comprehensive picture of the man's work but it also means that the album lacks really any sort of cohesion. This lack of cohesion is further exacerbated by the track listing heavily favoring cover songs. Of the 24 tracks included: 16 are covers and 8 were written by Dylan. Comprising the 8 Dylan compositions are all 4 of the live tracks, and 4 studio tracks (half of which feature no vocals by Dylan).

In an interview with session keyboardist Al Kooper to promote the release of ASP, Kooper mentions that he thought the name of the album was going to be something like Folk Songs of America. In my opinion that hypothetical album would have been much more positively received especially if it included some of the covers that didn't make it onto Self Portrait. In this post I want to present my ideal version of this album and briefly discuss where I sourced the tracks from.

Bob Dylan - Folk Songs of America 1. Spanish is the Loving Tongue (1970) 3:08

2. Thirsty Boots (ASP) 4:07

3. Belle Isle (ASP) 2:35

4. This Evening So Soon (ASP) 4:49

5. Early Morning Rain (SP) 3:34

6. Railroad Bill (ASP) 2:47

7. Take A Message to Mary (SP) 2:46

8. Annie's Going To Sing Her Song (ASP) 2:23

9. A Fool Such As I (Dylan) 2:44

10. Alberta #3 (ASP) 2:37

11. Wild Mountain Thyme (Isle of Wight) 2:51

Total Runtime: 34:21

The material from the Self Portrait sessions has been released on multiple albums and archival compilations in the years and decades following the original recordings. The main sources I investigated were as follows: Self Portrait (1970) Dylan (1973)

Another Self Portrait (2013) The Isle of Wight Concert (2013)

Travelin' Thru (2019)

The 50th Anniversary Collection 1969 (2019)

1970 (2021)

In the end I used tracks from all these releases apart from Travelin' Thru and the 1969 collection.

Another Self Portrait was my main source. ASP is home to some of the greatest recordings of Dylan's entire career and many are featured in this playlist. Why songs like "Railroad Bill", "This Evening So Soon" and "Thirsty Boots" were excluded from inclusion on SP itself is beyond me. Furthermore "Belle Isle" is given new life by the removal of the orchestral overdubs added to the SP version.

Two tracks from the original album are included more or less out of necessity. "Early Morning Rain" didn't receive a stripped down version on ASP and the alternate version of "Take A Message To Mary" that can be found on the 1969 collection seems to have been poorly mixed.

"Spanish Is The Loving Tongue" is taken from the forthcoming 1970 release scheduled for February 2021. This track was previously released on the ultra-limited 50th Anniversary Collection 1970 that released in late 2020. As 1970 is for all intents and purposes the same album but expanded and with a wider release I chose to source it from there. The song itself is a magnificent rendition. Dylan recorded the song many times from 1969-1970, the best version being an outtake from the New Morning sessions, however this is easily the best attempt from the recording of SP. The piano is reminiscent of the New Morning version where as the vocals start by sounding like "country crooner" Dylan of 1969's Nashville Skyline before morphing into his natural voice.

"A Fool Such As I" comes from 1973's Dylan, allegedly released out of retaliation toward Bob for leaving Columbia for Asylum Records. The album itself is mostly constructed of outtakes from New Morning but also two from SP being "A Fool Such As I" and a horrendous version of "Spanish Is The Loving Tongue".

The last track is "Wild Mountain Thyme" from the Isle of Wight 1969 concert. This was the concert that the live material was sourced from on SP and I thought it'd be nice to include a live track as a nod to the original album. The Isle of Wight concert was never given a standalone release and was instead issued as an extra for the deluxe release of ASP. "Wild Mountain" was the only traditional/cover song he performed that night and is a highlight of the entire show.

I think this produces a very high quality album even if it doesn't reach the level of excellence set by the albums directly proceeding it. I would say it runs a bit short, nowhere near his shortest album but a bit short still. If I were to add anything, "House Carpenter" and "These Hands" from ASP would be my first picks, followed by "Folsom Prison Blues" from Travelin' Thru.

So there you go, consider giving this playlist a go yourself and tell me what you think. I think that improvements could be potentially made to the sequencing to blend Dylan's two distinct voices of this period better but i'm not sure how. I'll be doing more of these in the future, so stick around if you're interested.